iPad bungle causes Qantas jet to strike runway

A Qantas jet with 152 passengers and crew on board scraped its tail on the runway at Sydney airport during take-off last year after pilots incorrectly entered data into an iPad attached to the plane's computer.

The mishap occured on August 1, 2014 after the pilots had inputed data saying that the 737 aircraft was 10 tonnes lighter than it actually was, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) found.

A flight attendant on the Sydney to Darwin flight who was seated at the rear of the plane during take-off reported hearing a "squeak: which led pilots to check whether the jethad scraped the tarmac.

The aviators then contacted Qantas maintenance engineers and made the decision to fly onto darwin after their instruments failed to detect any indication of a tail strike or dmage to the aircraft.

Once they made it to Darwin the pilots found paint damage which confirmed the plane had scraped the runway.

However, depite the impact a cartridge containing the plane's tail strike sensor was intact, indicating the plane "only just contacted the ground during take-off", according to the ATSB.

When the pilots checked the 737's performance figures on their iPad they discovered that the take-off eight was 10 tonnes lighter than the aircraft's 76.4 tonnes.